25 MAY 2015 by ideonexus

 Kai Krause: The Uncertainty Principle

Heisenberg’s idea had quickly been dubbed Unschärferelation, which transliterates to “unsharpness relationship,” but as there is really no such term in English ('blurred', 'fuzzy', 'vague' or 'ambiguous' have all been tried), the translation ended up as "the Uncertainty Principle"—when he had not used either term at all (some point to Eddington). And what followed is really quite close to the analogy as well: rather than stating that either position or momentum are "as yet undetermin...
Folksonomies: physics semantics
Folksonomies: physics semantics
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12 APR 2013 by ideonexus

 Laplace's Demon

We may regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future. An intellect which at a certain moment would know all forces that set nature in motion, and all positions of all items of which nature is composed, if this intellect were also vast enough to submit these data to analysis, it would embrace in a single formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and those of the tiniest atom; for such an intellect nothing would be uncertain an...
Folksonomies: prediction chaos theory
Folksonomies: prediction chaos theory
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If an intellect could know all the positions and motions of the Universe at one point could predict the future.

05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus

 There is No Supernatural

There is no supernatural, there is only nature. Nature alone exists and contains all. All is. There is the part of nature that we perceive, and the part of nature that we do not perceive. ... If you abandon these facts, beware; charlatans will light upon them, also the imbecile. There is no mean: science, or ignorance. If science does not want these facts, ignorance will take them up. You have refused to enlarge human intelligence, you augment human stupidity. When Laplace withdraws Cagliostr...
Folksonomies: nature
Folksonomies: nature
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All is nature.

02 FEB 2012 by ideonexus

 The Scientist Knows the God of Newton

The scientist who recognizes God knows only the God of Newton. To him the God imagined by Laplace and Comte is wholly inadequate. He feels that God is in nature, that the orderly ways in which nature works are themselves the manifestations of God's will and purpose. Its laws are his orderly way of working.
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A god who is in nature.